Movie Comments - Fahrenheit 9/11
Jun. 28th, 2004 12:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
patgundI'm not going to do a review per se on Fahrenheit 9/11, both because the subject doesn't lend itself to a review as such, (any comments would be subjective based on my knowledge), and because I don't want to cheapen the subject matter with my usual snarkiness and sarcasm.
I'll start off by saying I still do *not* like Michael Moore. There were a couple of scenes with him in it that really made my teeth grind, (when he rents the ice cream truck in DC to read the Patriot Act over the PA system was one.)
That being said, it's about bloody time that someone stood up in the US media and said "Hey, look, Saudi Arabia is *NOT* our friend. Which Moore goes on in detail about, including the business and social ties between the House of Saud and the Bush family and friends, and the fact that the Bin Laudin family hasn't completely cut all ties with their "black sheep" Osama. (A couple of family members attended the wedding of Osama's son, for example.)
And SA still has ties with the various terror groups. Real, documented ties. Yet we didn't see the administration go after SA. No, we spirited 142 Saudis, including members of the Bin Laudin family, out of the country on 9/13/01, the day the FAA slowly started to ease the "no-fly" order. One former FBI agent said that he would have interviewed the Bin Laudin family first, figuring they could have gotten at least some background data on Osama that way. But they were flown out before that could be done.
And it went into detail on how the current administration cut counter-terrorism funding and undervalued terrorism intellegence before 9/11. Not news per se, but interesting none the less.
They showed some of the unredacted parts of Bush's ANG record, which Moore got a copy of under the FoiA in 2000. Some of the data, which has been blacked out in the version released by the White House, is quite interesting. (Example: the ANG Major who lost flight status at the same time as Bush for not taking a pilots physical, was a business partner and investor with Bush after their ANG service, and is the business represenative for the Bin Laudin family in the US. Which could just be an example of two service buddies helping each other,)
A lot of the data comes as no surprise to me, since I tend to read several news sources, do some "blog reading", and try to get a range of data and information. But, for someone who is used to only the current US media and how they pretty much *don't* do their job anymore, it may come as a major shock and surprise. And maybe a wake-up call, both for the public and the media.
I have to give some major complements to how Moore showed the uniformed branch of the Secret Service, the Oregon State Police, (Do you know how many officers that the Oregon State Police have watching the Oregon shoreline??? One. Part-time.), and the great majority of the the men and women serving in the armed forces. Yes, he showed some of the "bad apples" as well, but he also showed many who were tired, who wanted to come home, but were still being professionals and serving with honour. My complements to him for this.
I also have to give him credit for how he handled the events of 9/11 - by not showing the events per se. You hear the impact, you see the dust and papers on the streets, you *don't* see the towers. For which I'm thankful. (And I can see why Moore may have handled this as delicately as possible - he lost a friend in the WTC.)
And, while I don't quite understand why fake bodies is a PG-13 and real bodies is a R rating, I completely understand why this movie got an R. The images are quite disturbing, and quite graphic.
I still don't much care for Michael Moore. For this movie however, he mostly got out of the way and let the data and story talk for themselves. Some parts of Fahrenheit 9/11 are funny. Some are shocking. Some will make you cry.
My recommendation? Irregardless of your political orientation, you may want to seriously consider going to see this movie. You may come out of it enraged or upset. You may agree with what is shown on the screen, or see it as utter tripe. But I strongly doubt you'll come out of it with no opinion.
On edit: made a mistake. According to the facts page on the film's website, the Bin Laudin family was spirited away on 9/13, the day the no-fly restriction started to slowly be eased. Not beforehand. My mistake, and I have corrected these comments.
I'll start off by saying I still do *not* like Michael Moore. There were a couple of scenes with him in it that really made my teeth grind, (when he rents the ice cream truck in DC to read the Patriot Act over the PA system was one.)
That being said, it's about bloody time that someone stood up in the US media and said "Hey, look, Saudi Arabia is *NOT* our friend. Which Moore goes on in detail about, including the business and social ties between the House of Saud and the Bush family and friends, and the fact that the Bin Laudin family hasn't completely cut all ties with their "black sheep" Osama. (A couple of family members attended the wedding of Osama's son, for example.)
And SA still has ties with the various terror groups. Real, documented ties. Yet we didn't see the administration go after SA. No, we spirited 142 Saudis, including members of the Bin Laudin family, out of the country on 9/13/01, the day the FAA slowly started to ease the "no-fly" order. One former FBI agent said that he would have interviewed the Bin Laudin family first, figuring they could have gotten at least some background data on Osama that way. But they were flown out before that could be done.
And it went into detail on how the current administration cut counter-terrorism funding and undervalued terrorism intellegence before 9/11. Not news per se, but interesting none the less.
They showed some of the unredacted parts of Bush's ANG record, which Moore got a copy of under the FoiA in 2000. Some of the data, which has been blacked out in the version released by the White House, is quite interesting. (Example: the ANG Major who lost flight status at the same time as Bush for not taking a pilots physical, was a business partner and investor with Bush after their ANG service, and is the business represenative for the Bin Laudin family in the US. Which could just be an example of two service buddies helping each other,)
A lot of the data comes as no surprise to me, since I tend to read several news sources, do some "blog reading", and try to get a range of data and information. But, for someone who is used to only the current US media and how they pretty much *don't* do their job anymore, it may come as a major shock and surprise. And maybe a wake-up call, both for the public and the media.
I have to give some major complements to how Moore showed the uniformed branch of the Secret Service, the Oregon State Police, (Do you know how many officers that the Oregon State Police have watching the Oregon shoreline??? One. Part-time.), and the great majority of the the men and women serving in the armed forces. Yes, he showed some of the "bad apples" as well, but he also showed many who were tired, who wanted to come home, but were still being professionals and serving with honour. My complements to him for this.
I also have to give him credit for how he handled the events of 9/11 - by not showing the events per se. You hear the impact, you see the dust and papers on the streets, you *don't* see the towers. For which I'm thankful. (And I can see why Moore may have handled this as delicately as possible - he lost a friend in the WTC.)
And, while I don't quite understand why fake bodies is a PG-13 and real bodies is a R rating, I completely understand why this movie got an R. The images are quite disturbing, and quite graphic.
I still don't much care for Michael Moore. For this movie however, he mostly got out of the way and let the data and story talk for themselves. Some parts of Fahrenheit 9/11 are funny. Some are shocking. Some will make you cry.
My recommendation? Irregardless of your political orientation, you may want to seriously consider going to see this movie. You may come out of it enraged or upset. You may agree with what is shown on the screen, or see it as utter tripe. But I strongly doubt you'll come out of it with no opinion.
On edit: made a mistake. According to the facts page on the film's website, the Bin Laudin family was spirited away on 9/13, the day the no-fly restriction started to slowly be eased. Not beforehand. My mistake, and I have corrected these comments.
